While his recovery from a ruptured achilles tendon last August has been miraculous, Jose Contreras's performance on the pitching mound this season has been disastrous. Contreras wasn't expected to be back until the middle of the season, if at all, but somehow he worked his way into the White Sox starting rotation out of the spring.Since then he's done nothing but work his way out of it, going 0-4 and posting an 8.31 ERA in five starts. Contreras had a very strong outing against the Blue Jays last week which provided a glimmer of hope that maybe he was getting his control back, but a shellacking in Dallas on Saturday put any of that optimism to rest. Now the Sox are saying they're concerned about Contreras, but they're not going to take him out of the rotation just yet.
"I don't want to give up on him," Ozzie Guillen said. "It's not my style, but I'd like to know what's going through my mind. I'm going crazy about it. It's driving his pitching coach (Don Cooper) crazy. The stuff is there. I've seen people get people out with less stuff, and that's a shame. Right now I don't have any answers about the enxt start. Right now I will pencil him in for the next start. We'll see if we change our mind the next couple days."The White Sox need to change their minds.
The fact of the matter right now is that with Contreras in the rotation the White Sox are basically just giving up a game every five days, which will only take a toll on their bullpen. Also, in a division that is packed as tightly as the AL Central is and probably will be all season, they can't afford to just pencil in a loss every five days.
Whether they want to promote somebody in house like a Clayton Richard or a Lance Broadway, or seek a free agent such as Pedro Martinez or Paul Byrd, Kenny Williams needs to get something done and I'm sure that he will. Whichever direction they go, though, that road better not lead to Jose Contreras sticking in the rotation. If it does then I'll guarantee they won't be playing in October.
